


Intermezzos

by nightdreamings



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: England - Freeform, Growing Up, One Shot, Post - The Last Battle, The Problem of Susan, sibling relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-12
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-08 14:18:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1944366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightdreamings/pseuds/nightdreamings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>n., a short part of a musical work (such as an opera) that connects major sections of the work; an interlude or diversion in between acts.</p>
<p>Or: once a queen, always a queen of anywhere</p>
            </blockquote>





	Intermezzos

On my thirteenth birthday, it suddenly seemed as though everyone had forgotten that I had been a grown-up before. It seemed as though everyone had forgotten that we had all been grown-ups before. Together.

How in the world was I supposed to be a child, learning arithmetic after archery and French after foreign relations? I acted as guardian to a nation. I was almost married, several times. I almost wanted to be married, once. 

Narnia was not only Lucy’s childhood dream. It was dreamlike, yes, but we grew, and we changed—didn’t we change? I watched my year-older brother, my almost-twin, grow into his power and his crown and his armor and his sword and all those cold and iron things that supported a warm and golden rule. I watched my little brother grow taller than me, as little brothers tend to do, into the gravity of his step and the justice his changed voice would mete out in honest measure. I watched my baby sister grow into a brave and beloved young woman, a queen for the populace, forever faithful and strong in her convictions. 

(I cannot find it in myself to be forever faithful.)

\--

Lipstick and nylons seemed to be a woman’s weapon in this world (second time denied a bow and arrow, what was I to do?) and I missed being a queen. A fifty-cent pot of rouge from the drugstore wasn’t the same as a Terebinthian perfume, but I decided to make do. And since I was no longer enough of a child to go home, couldn’t I at least try to be enough of a woman in England? 

I didn’t understand how I could go from thirty and a queen to twelve and a schoolgirl and then, suddenly, somehow, be too old to go back and grow up again. The ground keeps being pulled out from under me and I am seasick, heartsick.

Anyone (my siblings) who fell through a wardrobe should know that things are not always as they seem. I do not forget anything. 

\--

On my twenty-first birthday, I was not a grown-up and none of us were together.

\--

It is funny, the way Aslan grants wishes. A little backwards, a little twisted. I asked for a growing-up undisturbed, uninterrupted, and look where it got me. 

(Now, I am a grown-up guardian outside the gates).

-

My lives have always moved in circles (I have heard, after all, that time is cyclical, and that history repeats itself [so, in all logical probability, I will see Narnia again]), but I am not one to wait around uselessly until my circle is complete. I am a queen, after all. 

(So until then, I will live.)


End file.
